Wesley's Appendix repost
by EastYorkDisneyFan
Summary: An unexpected pain turns out to be more than just a little stomach ache for Wesley Crusher
1. Chapter 1

Wesley's Appendix by EastYorkDisneyfan

Disclaimer: These characters are created by Gene Roddenberry and owned by Paramount pictures.

This story takes place sometime in the third season of Star Trek the Next Generation. Captain Picard has gotten to know Wesley pretty well since the time they spent in a shuttle craft together in "Samaritan Snare," after that and the incident in "Q Who", where Q introduced them to the Borg. Captain Picard began paying more attention to Wesley in the absence of his mother. Their relationship developed into a sort of father son relationship.

Star Trek: The Next Generation -

Chapter One: A Pain In the Night

It's a special relationship that is harbored between mother and son. When that mother winds up being a single mother raising a young boy it can be especially challenging. That wasn't the case for Chief Medical Officer Beverly Crusher. Somehow, in the passing of her late husband Jack she'd forged an unbreakable bond with her now teenage son that spanned more than time and space could measure. A year of her son's life had escaped her as she took over at Starfleet Medical, but as she sat in her smaller accommodations in her office aboard the Enterprise, she felt at peace knowing he was just a few floors away.

It had now been a month since Doctor Crusher had returned and Wesley was glad to have his mom back on board the Enterprise. Of course it had been nice to enjoy the freedom of eating whatever he wanted when he wanted and to not be restricted by curfew once inside his quarters, but he still missed her. It was an odd feeling being separated from the only family that he had by such a space.

Wesley lay in his bed in the quarters that he and his mother now shared again. The chronometer next to his bedside lit up the numbers atomically, as a constant reminder that he should be asleep. In Earth time it would be considered a weekend, but he would have second duty in the morning on Alpha shift. If he didn't get to sleep soon he would be dead on his feet. Wesley's shift on the bridge that morning would be staring at 1100 hours and he would usually get up at about 0930 hours.

"Sleep!' his tired mind screamed.

If only his stomach would cooperate.

He tossed in the bed, shifting from one side to the next, crunching his knees almost up to his chin, lying on his stomach, curled up tightly in a ball, nothing seem to ease the dull throbbing ache that permeated his abdomen. To make matters worse it would seem that the condenser in the room was also malfunctioning, because in one moment he was sweating profusely in the room, and the next he was freezing cold.

As a dull stab of pain shot across his belly he sat up in the bed quickly.

"Oh...God...what was that?" he groaned grabbing his stomach trying to hold himself as still as possible as the wave of pain rushed through him.

He tried to get up but barely made it to his knees before the crippling pain took hold of him again, and he lay against his bed panting.

As the pain let up for a brief moment he managed to call out loud...

"Computer...what is the location of Dr. Crusher..." the last part came out as more of a grunt as he tried to get to a standing position.

"Sorry. Please repeat."

"Locate Dr. Crusher!" he screamed. The computer was use to the younger family members on board asking for the location of family members without using names or ranks. He could have just as easily said "where's my mom," but it just seemed silly.

"Dr. Beverly Crusher is in sickbay"

Wesley glanced at the chronometer again; it was more than three hours before he needed to be up for his shift. He would have to get something for this pain if he had any hopes of getting to sleep. With a loud groan he heaved himself up to search for clothes. The sudden movement brought about a surge of nausea as he scrambled to the bathroom to purge his stomach contents. Each time he heaved it felt like someone was trying to gut his stomach with a 'Bat'leth. After what seemed liked hours the vomiting ceased and the dry heaves went away. They were now replaced with a fire which stretched across his belly and back. He rinsed out his mouth in the sink and stumbled back to his closet to get some sweat pants, a t-shirt and his running shoes.

Wesley decided that he needed to see his mom about the pain as it felt like it was getting worse. He left the quarters that he shared with his mom. It was one of the few of the officer's quarters that had two rooms in it as most of them were single adults. The thing that Wesley really liked about it was that he also had his own entrance to the main hallway so that if he was working late he didn't have to disturb his mom when he came in.

He made his way to sickbay trying to suck up as much of the pain as he could take. He tried to walk straight but to the rest of the world it was obvious he was doubled over in pain.

Dr. Crusher heard the doors open and was surprised but delighted to see her son traipse through the door.

"Hey! You're up early...what are you..." she did not get to finish her sentence before she noticed his posture and the look of sheer agony on his face.

"Whoa, what's wrong Wes?" she asked reaching to steady him.

Wesley looked at her and said "Mom my stomach hurts ...really bad..., and it woke me up."

Doctor Crusher reached up and placed the back of her hand on his forehead and said "You do feel pretty warm, do you want some help getting up on the exam table?"

Wesley said no as he got up on it with little more than a grimace. The CMO then asked him to lie down on it. Wesley tried his best to lay flat but each time he did the pain flared even more.

"I can't ..."

"Just lie whichever way is comfortable Wes." She was really starting to worry now. He had lain down, on his left side clutching his stomach, his shirt pulled up, his eyes closed as if trying to find his "safe place" from the pain.

The fact that he was willing to let her examine him amazed her. Most times he was extremely reluctant and would often hide his illnesses to avoid her "doctoring" him. He was breathing quickly through his mouth. She knew he must be really hurting.

"Wes, take your hand and show me where it hurts." His clenched fists released long enough for him to point to an area between his belly button and hip. Doctor Crusher pushed on it.

"Does it hurt when I press here?"

"No." She slowly released the pressure and got the response she expected. Wesley gasped quickly and clutched his abdomen tighter.

"It hurts when I stop pressing...?"

"Yes." he practically screamed as she picked up the tricorder scanning him from head to feet.

"Body temperature 38.3 degrees, BP and heart rate are elevated...any nausea or vomiting?" Wesley nodded as she centered the device over the lower right quadrant of his hip. Pulling his pants down a bit she could feel the heat emanating from the area.

"I'm afraid it's a little more than a belly-ache son. You have got a hot appendix, and it's gonna have to come out."

She ran a soothing hand through his hair gently stroking it.

Wesley groaned and shook his head.

"I've got duty in three hours..."

"I'm afraid they will have to do without the amazingly talented acting Ensign Crusher, at least for a few days."

He opened his eyes nearly pleading with his mother. "A few days, will you tell the captain that?"

"Of course Wes, you need to have surgery, I happen to out rank our captain when it comes to the health of our crew." She leaned down and pretended to whisper."I have kind of "took a liking to" this particular crew member. I think I need to keep him around, so we need to get that appendix out now."

Beverly summoned Nurse Ogawa to prepare the OR for emergency surgery.

Wesley Then asked "Mom?"

"Yes Wes?" she answered as calmly as she could, she did not want to stress Wesley out about the potential dangers of surgery, and he needed to be calm and so did she. She stared at the readings on her tricorder. Wesley reached up and touched her hand forcing a connection to her, breaking the practiced clinical detachment as she stared into her son's worried eyes.

"Will you perform the surgery on me? I know it's probably against the rules but I'd feel more comfortable with you doing it..." Beverly stared at him and she smiled and nodded as she helped him off of the bed and helped him walk over to the surgical prep room.

Once they arrived there one of the nurses from Sickbay began helping Wesley to change into his gown for the surgery. In the meantime his mother and Doctor Adams were getting ready as well. Another couple of nurses were also preparing the Operating suite for Wesley's surgery when he was brought in. After he was placed on the table and prepped his mom came in dressed in her sterile surgery garbs.

"Okay Wes, I'm just going to give you a sedative with this hypospray to help you to sleep for your surgery. Just count down from ten and when you wake up it will be all done."

Beverly's mouth and hair were covered by a protective mask but her piercing blue eyes bore into her sons as he stared at her and began his count.

"Ten...Nine...Eight...Sev..." He tried hard to fight the anesthesia but by the time he reached seven, his eyes fluttered shut as his face grew slack and he was under.

"Okay let's get underway, Dr. Adams will you assist?" She requested ignoring the doctor's somewhat irritated stare. Doctor Adams initially wanted to do the surgery herself but Doctor Crusher had insisted that SHE would be performing the surgery because she was not going to lie to her son. Most of the staff in sickbay knew how protective she was of Wesley, so the doctor unwillingly gave in against protocol and agreed to assist her with the surgery.

Dr. Crusher was handed the sharp bladed scalpel and she glanced up at her son's face. She looked down at his warm tender belly and froze for a moment. "This is my son I'm cutting into..." she thought.

"Dr. Crusher, are you ready to proceed?"

"Yes..." she stammered snapping out of it as she expertly made the first incision into her son's abdomen and began to cut through the layers of soft tissue and muscle in her search for the inflamed appendix.

The two doctors worked at a steady pace to reach and detach the infected appendix from its superior organ, but discovered that the miniscule worm shaped organ had ruptured spreading toxins into his abdominal cavity and blood stream.

Once all parts of the destroyed organ were removed the doctors irrigated the internal areas with saline to prevent infiltration of infection. With tender care she closed up the internal incisions with thin ribbons of laser thread and finished the outside incision with a thin stitch that went perpendicular to his hip bone and covered it with a dermal generator.

She walked up to the head of the bed as the materials from the surgery were now being removed or tossed away, and she pulled down her mask kissing her unconscious son on the forehead. The surgery had taken more than hour to complete, and he would be expected to sleep at least another hour. The healing rest would give his body time to lower its temperature and fight any potential infection that lingered.

Beta read and edited by Jadeblueafterglow17


	2. Chapter 2

Wesley's Appendix "Reboot"

Chapter 2

Wesley had been moved into a private room after his surgery and the monitors made continuous observations of his vitals. As Beverly Crusher made notes on her PADD, she noticed that each indicated that her son was regaining consciousness. She placed a cool hand on his forehead and still felt him to be slightly warm, as she grabbed a hypo spray and started to add medication to it and make some adjustments.

Voices.

That was the first sensation he had...as his ears brought him back to consciousness. The next was pain as he felt a searing fire spread across his lower abdomen. It wasn't the same ache as before but it certainly wasn't the pleasant euphoria he was expecting.

A small groan startled Dr. Crusher as she turned her attention towards her son. Lines of pain were creased on his face and forehead as he was about to reach towards his incision but her firm hands stopped him.

"No sir…."

She placed a hypo spray to his shoulder and injected a long burst. Wesley seemed to settle down almost instantly as his hand relaxed and fell back down by the bedside.

"That will be sore for a little while yet," she smoothed a cool palm alongside his face. "How are you feeling otherwise?"

"Tired…" he whispered.

"Why don't you close those big brown eyes of yours and get some rest. You had a rough night…and it'll take….." she didn't get a chance to finish her sentence before she noticed his eyes were shut and his breathing had evened out again. He had dropped off to sleep that quickly. He was still under the influence of the anesthesia. She kissed his forehead and walked towards her office to look at the results of the blood they tested.

Staring at the results, she pondered why she had been the one to operate on her son. Was it because she didn't trust another doctor to do? Or maybe it was because she was worried about how he might react. Wesley had never really been to any other doctor, as she had been his doctor his entire life. She had treated him for ear infections, minor cuts and bruises, and even the common cold. The only time she realized she would need some help is when he had developed tonsillitis when he was ten.

Beverly shook her head and frowned at the memory. They were so badly inflamed and infected, she knew they would have to come out. Sitting in that chilly reception area with half a dozen other parents she got the frantic message from the nurse.

"Dr. Crusher…we need you immediately."

"What's wrong? Is it Wesley?"

"Just follow me please." The nurse said hastily as Beverly fell instep beside her. As they reached their destination she was handed a pair of gloves and a mask and froze at the sight before her. In the corner of the pre op room, curled up as small as he could possibly fit, his knees pulled tightly to his chest was her ten year old son. A brown head of hair rested on those knees, his terrified brown eyes peering up at the masked strangers surrounding him.

When his eyes met hers the terror melted away instantly as worry faded.

"He keeps pulling out the IV. He's very young, we don't like to sedate them too much if it's not necessary."

Beverly walked over to him as Wesley practically melted into her arms. A tiny voice whispered in her ear.

"Please don't leave me mom. Please stay with me…" She held him tighter and nodded as she did exactly as she said she would and stayed with him til he was sedated and was brought back to him immediately upon his waking.

As she sat her desk entering some notes onto the computer she was sure she made the right decision to operate on her son with the assistance of Dr. Adams. She had made a promise to him that she intended to keep.

Ensign Jonson watched as Data relieved the lieutenant at the Conn station and Lt. Worf glided into his station at tactical. Still he waited to be relieved from his duty station. Captain Picard noticed the Ensign's antsy behavior and promptly dismissed him. He still had five more minutes but the shift had been uneventful, and they were all crawling the walls for an escape from the uneventful tour of space. Picard glanced at the chronometer on his comm. panel once again and noticed that his youngest crew member seemed to be running later than usual. He touched a button on his side panel.

"Computer, locate Acting Ensign Wesley Crusher."

"Wesley Crusher is currently in Sick Bay." Picard's brow furrowed as he touched the panel again.

"Picard to Sickbay."

Back in Sick Bay Doctor Crusher heard the call while she was checking on Wesley's vital signs as he was still deeply asleep.

"Captain this is Beverly. May I help you?"

"Ensign Crusher is late for duty please have him join us immediately."

"I'm afraid that's not possible Captain, my patient is not going anywhere."

"Patient?"

"He just came out of surgery just a short while ago."

Picard straightened and stood up from his chair as the rest of the bridge's complement heard the conversation.

"Is Mr. Crusher alright?"

"He's resting now." She replied rubbing her warm hands against her sons trying to warm them.

"Thank you Doctor, Picard out."

Captain Picard made his way away from the center of the bridge as Commander Riker stood to take his seat.

"Number one, you have the bridge. Would you find a temporary replacement for Acting Ensign Crusher?"

"Aye sir."

No explanation was needed. Wesley was one of their own, and the rest of the bridge crew knew how the captain felt about Wesley and Doctor Crusher. It wasn't the same as if they were his own family but over the last year he had developed a soft spot in his heart for the teen. Although Wesley and Beverly had long since forgiven him for the events surrounding Jack Crusher's death, he felt he should look out for his dear friend's son and wife as they had been entrusted to his care aboard the Enterprise.

Captain Picard arrived in sickbay just as Wesley was beginning to stir and wake up again. Doctor Crusher was sitting next to him holding his hand and reassuring him that she was there. Wesley slowly opened his eyes for the second time.

"Hi sweetheart."

His eyes found her face as he tried hard to focus through the haze.

"Hi…everything ok?" he croaked.

"Yes, the surgery went fine. It was a little longer than expected because your appendix actually ruptured. That's probably why your pain was so significant by the time you finally got to me. You should definitely come to me much sooner when something like this happens next time, okay?" Wesley nodded.

"I'm glad you are better Wesley. Please don't worry about your shift on the Bridge and in Engineering. Commander Riker is taking care of it….you just rest and get well soon." The captain patted his hand.

"Yes sir..." was his absent reply as the lingering effects of the anesthesia took the young man with the ever boyish face, back under.

Picard glanced at Beverly, a concerned look on his face, but she smiled warmly.

"He's had some pain meds recently and the anesthesia is really knocking him out. He'll be asleep off and on for the next 18 hours."

"Hmm. Well, take good care of him 'Doctor'." He smiled

"Of course Captain" he took one last glance at the woman and young man he'd grown so fond of and left sick bay.

Beverly made her way back to her son's side, and pulled up a chair beside him. A nurse was handling the only other case in sick bay at the moment and she wanted -needed to be with her son. She kissed his cheek, and stroked soothing fingers through his hair. She could see his eyes move beneath his lids as he tried to reach the surface of consciousness, possibly aware of her presence. Beverly held his hand and watched her son sleep.

2200 hours

Dr. Adams could no longer allow this to go on. She had been on duty for more than an hour and had seen that Dr. Crusher was still at her son's side. She'd promptly fallen asleep in an extremely uncomfortable position, and she knew the poor woman would regret the posture sooner rather than later.

She tapped Beverly on her shoulder. When she did not rouse she shook her gently.

Beverly startled awake.

"What…what's wrong?"

"Dr. Crusher…your shift ended five hours ago…you should go and get some proper rest."

She fixed her hair and absently wiped at Wesley's arm where she noticed she'd either sweated on or perhaps drooled, and ignored the doctor's comments as she looked at her son's vitals.

"I am off duty…I'm taking care of my son." She adjusted Wesley's pillow, and pulled his blanket more snugly around him. The room illumination had been reduced to simulate darkness to help encourage sleep.

"Beverly, you've been here all night and all day." She placed her hand on her shoulder. "Just take a nap in your own bed, you know he'll sleep probably another ten hours.

"I said I wouldn't leave…"

"If he wakes up I'll call you immediately. You know I will look after Wesley as if he were my own child, please go get some rest." Beverly gave Dr. Adams a hug and turned to her son.

"Sleep tight Wes, I'll be back in the morning, and we'll get you some breakfast…." She whispered and left the room. Dr Adams stared at his vitals and made notations on her PADD as she too left Wesley to sleep.

Beta read and edited by Jadeblueafterglow17


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

0100 hrs.

A nurse went in to check on Ensign Crusher. She adjusted his IV medication and noticed he had somehow kicked off all of his blankets. When she went to pull them back up on him, she noticed a light sheen of perspiration on his face and neck. His dark brown hair was nearly plastered to his forehead and he seemed to be curled up in the bed.

She took a tricorder and scanned him noting that his temperature was elevated. As she finished her scan she was startled to see a set of brown eyes staring at her.

"Ensign Crusher? Are you alright?"

Wesley stared at her with clenched teeth breathing sharply, his hand clutching his abdomen.

"Where's my - Where's Dr. Crusher…?" he stammered.

"She was exhausted Wes, we sent her back to quarters. It's late…what's wrong? I just gave you pain meds an hour ago."

"Not working." He delivered in short clipped sentences as he rocked on the bed panting. The nurse quickly screamed for Dr. Adams, as the doctor came barreling into the private room.

"How's my favorite patient?" Wesley glared at her as she unfolded his hands away from his sides and pulled away his clothing. She touched the place on his belly and found it extremely warm to the touch. In fact, Wesley was significantly warm all over.

"Oh dear heavens, give me your tricorder." the nurse handed over the equipment as she turned Wesley over to make him lay flat. He pulled his legs in tightly, unable to escape the agony coursing through him. She scanned him quickly closed her eyes and sighed angrily.

"Get the OR ready for surgery, and get a hold of Dr. Crusher tell her she needs to get down here immediately. I'm going to scrub up." the fair skinned doctor replied. She pulled her long brown hair back in a hair clip she kept in her jacket pocket-constantly at the ready, and stared at her patient with calm hazel eyes.

As they began to move the anti-grav bed - Wesley held the doctor's arm firmly. "What's wrong with me?"

"There is sign of infection and something serious is going on at the internal wound site. If we don't go in and fix it and find out what's wrong, you will only get sicker..."

A brief flicker of panic crossed his young face, but he quickly recovered.

"Will my mom do the surgery...?"

"She's on her way now sweetheart, but we have to get started before she gets here." Dr. Adams nodded to the nurse as she placed a mask over Wesley's nose and mouth.

"Just relax and breathe deeply and it will all be but a memory soon." She softly stroked the wet tendrils of hair from Wesley's forehead.

He nodded slowly, a single tear escaping his eye lid as she gently wiped it away. His pain and terror filled eyes slid shut, the anesthesia taking him under yet again.

"Okay he's out. I want to be ready to start in 2 minutes. This kid is not dying on my watch." the doctor demanded.

By the time Beverly Crusher was called to Sick Bay, her son was in the surgical suite and was already being administered anesthesia. She didn't want to frighten him, so she did not burst in. How dare Dr. Adams not consult her before beginning such an operation on her son, her only son!

She paced back and forth as the nurse finally handed Dr. Crusher a PADD containing all of the current scans, readings and vital statistics on Wesley.

She was about to scrub in and take over the surgery when she suddenly staggered to one of the chairs in sick bay. Wesley's temp had soared since she'd left, it was blatantly obvious that an infection had set in, and his stats were elevated straight across the board. He was in pain, and he was not putting out any fluids. Something was wrong with the integrity of the intestinal wall.

"Oh God..." she whispered covering her mouth. She walked up to the surgical suite and peered through the window as she watched Dr. Adams reopen his belly wound and began cutting into her son.

Meanwhile in the surgical suite Doctor Adams was busy searching for the source of Wesley's infection and pain. She found there was some residual fluids build up in his belly from the first surgery, and pus indicative of infection in the stub of the appendix that had been left behind from the first surgery. She explored the abdominal cavity carefully and found she needed to remove a small portion of his large intestine as the infection had started spreading to it as well. A simple appendectomy had turned into a major operation in a matter of minutes.

Almost two hours later, after completing a number of complicated laser guided sutures, she carefully cleaned out the wound and inspected everything before performing a lavage, attaching a JP drain and closing him up again.

The nurse hung more antibiotics and a 3 day drip as a chest tube was taped to his chest.

As soon as Dr. Adams emerged from the surgical suite, she saw a distraught Doctor Crusher waiting at the glass. She disposed of her gloves and mask and approached the nearly shell-shocked mother.

"I'm sorry we couldn't wait for your arrival Dr. Crusher, time was of the essence."

Beverly took her eyes from where her son was being cleaned up and turned towards Dr. Adams. She took the worried mother by the shoulder and told her what she had found and what she had to do to help Wesley get better.

"I was hoping to avoid a more invasive procedure but part of the intestine was compromised. He'll have a Jackson Pratt that you can take-down in two days. I wanted to rule out the chance of sepsis."

"Are you certain that all of the infected material was removed?"

"We took multiple camera images internally, you can check them yourself." Dr. Adams walked past Dr. Crusher and was surprised to feel a hand on her shoulder.

"Thank You. Thanks for doing what needed to be done." Dr. Adams enveloped Beverly into a hug.

"I'd sooner cut off my left arm than let anything happen to that boy! Now go, clean up, and don't let him see you like this. The nurse will get him situated."

Doctor Crusher was glad that her son was going to be okay. She left briefly and returned just before 0400hrs and said that she wanted to stay for the rest of the night until he woke up. They then took him to one of the private rooms in sickbay where Wesley could be monitored and Doctor Crusher could be beside him in one of the additional anti-grav beds that they had in there for just that reason.

Beverly sat beside her son pondering to herself why she let herself operate on him in the first place, and how could she have missed the secondary infection when she scanned him with the tricorder before she went to her quarters for the night. She just hoped that he would wake up soon - she needed to confirm that he was okay -and that the worst was over for him. She then went over to the computer terminal in the room and briefly looked at her eelier scan to see if she had missed anything, she did see a slightly elevated white blood cell count and a fever a little bit higher but she had put it off as just being part of the infection he had been dealing with before, the surgery.

Later the next morning at about 0900 hours, Wesley began waking up. This time he seemed a little more alert then he did after the first surgery. He felt someone holding his right hand. His eyes slowly opened and he saw he was in sickbay. At first he couldn't remember why he was there, but then he felt a bit of pain in his back and across his belly which was nowhere near as bad as the pain he had earlier that morning. He turned his head and saw his Mom resting her head on the bed beside him. He called softly to her to try and wake her. She stirred a bit as he tried to move his hand that she was holding. She lifted her head and saw that his brown eyes were open.

"Wes? Hi. How do you feel?" she smoothed her hand back and forth over her son's cheek.

"Like I've been beaten," he said.

"I can imagine..."

"Mom, what happened, I remember waking up in pain and Doctor Adams told me I needed surgery but I thought I'd already had surgery."

Beverly sighed, hearing her son's raspy, confused voice did nothing to calm her psyche.

"Wes, you had a secondary infection in your belly from the first surgery." She buried her face in her hands as he tried desperately to keep his eyes open to hear the rest of her statement.

"Okay?"

"As it turns out we ...I had left a little bit of your appendix behind, which still was infected. Unfortunately the infection started spreading and Doctor Adams had to remove a small piece of your intestine. Don't worry, you'll be fine, but you'll have to stay in sickbay for a little while longer. Ok?"

Wesley reached out and grabbed his mother's hand, and said "Thanks for being honest with me." She leaned down and kissed his forehead.

"Always, Get some sleep Wes," she replied.

"Are you leaving again?" his brown eyes had grown impossibly large again and that frightened child stared back at her, his face filled with fear.

"Not a chance. I have some work I need to do but I'll be right here. I'll come and check on you frequently but you should get some sleep. This is my bed kiddo." she pointed to the anti grav bed. "You're not leaving my sight until you're up and about. Now get some rest." She shook his hair as he watched her walk away before he closed his eyes and let the sounds of the computer scanning his vitals take him back off to dreamland.

Six Hours Later

Wesley took a deep breath and felt a slow spreading pain across his belly. He was about to cry out but then he remembered that even small movements seemed to hurt. He heard footsteps and quickly a hypojet was injected into his arm.

"Take slow breaths until the pain eases..." the soothing voice of his mother warned. He complied as he still kept his eyes tightly closed. "Good...take it easy...you keep tossing in your sleep and I'm going to have to put you in a stasis field son. Be still."

Slowly his pain ebbed away as he sighed deeply. He still felt a presence as he realized he was lying on his left side.

"Wes, you have a visitor..."

Slowly he opened his eyes and squinted at a shiny yellow and silver alien being ...holding what looked like a handful of Tribbles.

"Nooooo..." Wesley shook his head moaning.

"Wesley?" the alien said.

Wesley thought for a moment, that alien sounded suspiciously familiar. He felt a firm hand grasp his shoulder as his name was called again.

"Wesley?" his eyes popped open as he fought the pull of sleep and saw the visage of commander Data standing before him.

"Data?" he whispered hoarsely.

"Yes, it is I Wesley. How are you feeling?"

"Ok I guess, a little sore, what are you doing here?"

"Well. You were sick and or injured."

"Yes."

"Your condition is serious enough to warrant a stay in sick bay."

"Well...yeah..."

"Is it not custom for family and friends to visit those who are infirmed?"

Wesley smiled.

"Well yeah Data...but which are you?"

Data looked confused for a moment as if Wesley had asked him a question that was going to overload his circuitry. Wesley saved him the trouble. He reached for the androids hand and patted it. "Data. The answer is C. All of the Above."

"I was not aware there was a multiple choice variant to the question."

Wesley chuckled and then groaned as it made his belly ache.

"Never mind Data, you're my friend and you're family. Ok?"

Data simply nodded. He suddenly handed him a furry creature and tucked it into his arm.

Completely drained Wesley stared at it with droopy eyes and stroked the animal's fur.

"What is this?"

"You do not recognize it?"

"Well yes, I do, it's a bear...a teddy bear."

"Not an actual Teddy Bear. It is replicated actually. It's a 20th century AA Milne Gund style Winnie the Pooh Bear. 'The Sort of Bear Who is Always There'."

Data stared at Wesley as he clutched the bear tighter to him nesting it into his arms. He held it just as the boy Christopher Robin in the story had done. His eyes closed slowly.

Beverly Crusher stood watch at the door touched by the uncharacteristically human exchange between Data and her son.

Data was unsure of what to do. He reached out and patted Wesley's shoulder.

As he turned to leave a hoarse whisper stopped him.

"Thanks for coming Data. Will you come back and see me later?"

"Yes Wes."

"Thanks for the bear."

"It was the least I could do." A small smile graced Wesley's lip as he succumbed to sleep again.

Beta read and edited by Jadeblueafterglow17


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